


Safe in the Dark

by Penkindisbestspecibus



Series: What you are in the Dark [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Boggartstuck, Crossover, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Existentialism, F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi, Post-Sburb/Sgrub, References to Suicide, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-16
Updated: 2014-10-26
Packaged: 2017-12-12 01:19:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/805480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Penkindisbestspecibus/pseuds/Penkindisbestspecibus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That which is broken can be put back together, but they'll never truly be the same again.</p><p>Twenty children (and that's what they were, are, will be) played a game and won a universe. They won 'Life' and 'Normal', but the shadows are always filled with terrifying things. The 'Boggart Incidents' threatened to destabilize their shaky equilibrium not only within themselves but without.</p><p>Everyone just wants to feel safe in the dark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Insomnia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long! I've been battling a case of writer's block flavoured by University work.
> 
> This isn't actually Patronusstuck - when I examined the concept, Patronusstuck would probably work best as a series of illustrations but I can't draw for shit. Otherwise it'd mostly be 'X encounters Dementor, casts Patronus! Patronus is Y! End of encounter!'. Which is boring. Their patronuses will probably still play a part though (I made a list and I'm using it for something gosh darn it).
> 
> But, if not about Patronuses, what is 'Safe in the Dark' about? It's basically a continuation of 'What you are in the Dark' but without the Dementor-focus. The Boggart Incidents have come and gone, and everyone is kind of reacting to it in their own ways.

There is something very, very wrong about this year’s students. She knew this the moment she laid eyes on them. Their eyes, their movements. They didn’t move, think, _react_ the way children did. One of the Weasley Twin’s set off a Whizzbanger. Twenty students reached not for wands, but for weapons that weren’t there. She had seen the way each of them had tensed, fluidly and smoothly entering subtle battle stances, ready to strike within a moment’s notice. Madame Pomfrey was an expert in treating wounds and ailments of nearly every kind. From battlefield triage to delicate treatments, there was no physical wound she didn’t know how to mend. But there was no spell to heal a mind.

She had seen the horrors of not only Voldemort’s war but Grindelwald’s, and if there was one thing she could never drive from her mind, it was the empty eyes of those who lived. Lived when all others died, when their friends and family had been taken into death’s embrace and they were left behind, wondering why it wasn’t them instead. But there had been no recent great war, and the students were too young to remember the horrors of Voldemort. Twenty students, all showing signs of traumatic experiences, in one generation? She didn’t believe in coincidences.

 

All this was why she was currently pinning the cheerful blue-eyed Hufflepuff in front of her with one of her best Mediwitch Knows Best stares.

 

“Mr Egbert, you have to take your Dreamless Sleep Potions.” John Egbert had been suffering from nightmares, frequent and frightening enough that his class work had begun to suffer. They had started recently, apparently triggered by what the entire school had begun to refer to as the ‘Boggart Incidents’. She was not surprised at all to learn that it had apparently centered on some of the Twenty students.

John smiled at her, cheerful and friendly, buck teeth as white as snow. “Sorry, I forgot, ma’am.” ‘Forgot’. John Egbert woke up in cold sweats or didn’t sleep at all. John Egbert had woken up with a scream so desperate, the rest of House Hufflepuff couldn’t stop sending him concerned looks. You didn’t ‘forget’ to take the one thing that could prevent that kind horror. That kind of absolute dread. She sighed, folding her hands across her lap patiently.

“Mr Egbert...” Her tone carries a warning, and he just smiles at her again, sheepishly. She sighs, relenting. “Why won’t you take the potion?” She’s exasperated now, but that’s mostly because John Egbert is a difficult patient. It’s hard to try and be stern with him, when he seems so... she doesn’t really have a word for it. Innocent? Naive? He seemed to radiate this ‘I’m a good boy, honest’ aura and you could tell he had his fingers crossed behind his back even before you learned he had engaged the Weasley Twin’s in a pranking war that had required the intervention of half the staff before it ended.

The smile falls for the briefest of seconds, and unsurety, nervousness and a strange sense of longing peek out from behind the facade. She feels almost voyeuristic, catching a glimpse of something she knows she was never meant to see. The momentary glimpse fades as quickly as it came. “I just forgot? I’ve been busy with all the homework.” She sighs. He’s lying, but she knows he won’t tell her the truth. “... Go back to bed, Mr Egbert.” He smiles at her again, slips off the bed and leaves silently.

 

She watches him leave, with a wistful stare.

 

* * *

 

The bubbling of the cauldron is the only thing that breaks the silence. Grey skinned fingers carefully work the knife, removing the organs of the flobberworms and preparing them to be used later in potions. The nubby-horned troll worked wordlessly, nimble hands working through practiced movements in a routine. Black eyes watch him move just as silently, tracking the way the knife splits the slick brown skin of the worms.

 

“... Makara hasn’t been sleeping.” He breaks the silence softly but with a suddenness that seems to scream. The knife pauses for but a moment before resuming it’s work, graceful in an almost sarcastic way. “I know.” The troll grunts in return, punctuating his reply with the slapping sound of disemboweled flobberworm landing on disemboweled flobberworm. Of course he knew. They were moirails. Snape would’ve been surprised if he didn’t. “Madame Pomfrey tells me that Egbert isn’t either.” The knife flashes a little too quickly, but the cut is still professional and perfect. There are times when Snape wonders how experienced Vantas is with knives.

“Your point, Professor?” The tone is respectful, if only grudgingly. Vantas has authority issues, a trait Snape found was disgustingly prevalent within the House of Lions. A little part of him is actually somewhat pleased that he has earned the Gryffindor's respect in some way. The rest of him still bubbles with annoyance. “You are moirails with Makara and... inclades with Egbert, aren’t you?” He was going to say ‘friend’ but Alternian terminology seemed more appropriate. More personal. Direct. Strictly speaking Vantas was both to Egbert, and Snape was fairly sure that all the students in the Boggart Incident were connected either by friendship, incladeship or both. Karkat only grunted in reply.

“As a Professor at Hogwarts, I am professionally concerned as to the well being of not only the students in my house, but the student body at large.” He said softly. A part of him was _personally_ concerned. A little bit. Not one he’d ever admit.

“And you’re talking to me about this why, Professor?” The next flobberworm is barely on his table for a scant few seconds before it’s disemboweled and flung into a barrel with the rest. He weighs his options, before deciding that being blunt will be the best option when dealing with Vantas. “Makara refuses to talk to me about it, and Egbert is a Hufflepuff.” Vantas said nothing. “I’m not blind, Vantas, so I’d appreciate it if you stopped behaving as though I was.”

 

He circles around the table, and Vantas pauses momentarily in his flobberworm slicing. “First the Boggarts, now nightmares and insomnia. Ampora flinches every time he so much as _holds_ his wand and Strider goes into his own world whenever he sees blood.” Red eyes meet his black ones. “I’m not an _idiot,_ Professor, so I’d appreciate it if you stopped behaving as though I was.” Snape falls silent, and they match wills in a silent contest. They both look away at the same time. The cauldron bubbling is the only sound that remains for what seems like hours.

“I can’t force you to tell me what happened, Vantas.” His voice is subdued now, quiet. “But it’s important that you talk to _someone_ about it. I may not be your head of House but I am... intimately familiar, with this kind of... issue.” Vantas returns to slicing his flobberworms, performing his detention with that same routine ease. “I’ll keep it in mind, Professor.”

His knifework has not dulled at all, and if he is bothered by their discussion he does not show it. “I know that it may feel as though nobody understands, but that is a lie. You are not alone.” The blade stills for a moment once more.

“With all due respect, Professor, we were never alone.” The knife moves in swift strokes again. They fall into a silence that could be called comfortable until the end of the hour.

 

* * *

 

The first one to work up the courage to ask the question on everybody’s lips is Hermione Granger. Dave Strider is so far from surprised by this that he is surprised at his lack of surprise. She looks nervous, and a little bit anxious, so he opts to break the ice himself.

“Sup Granger.” He gives her a cool nod, and she returns it awkwardly. “What can I do for you?”

“We were curious.” She blurts out, with all the subtlety of a bulldozer. Smooth. He could admire that. “Yes, they do match the carpet.” She falters for a moment, unsure before regaining her composure. The reference is lost on her. Probably for the better. She probably wouldn’t like the implications. “It’s... your boggart.” He was expecting that, but the reminder still sends electricity up his spine, and his fingers twitch.

“Shit, Granger, take a girl out to dinner before you go rooting through their deepest darkest secrets.” She looks flustered, and he gives himself an imaginary pat on the back. He has no intention of answering her inquiries. He has no intention of answering anyone’s inquiries about his Boggart. The only people who matter already know why. The Egbert-Harley twins had practically sandwiched him in a cuddle pile in the Room of Requirement.

Hermione squeaked lightly and he smirked. She started stammering, so he just ran a hand through his hair. “Look, Granger, I don’t really want to just spill my guts all over the table about it, to someone I barely know, no offence. Is there anything else you’d like to talk about that isn’t about my crippling, absolutely terrifying, deep-seated and did I mention completely and utterly _personal_ fears?” She didn’t answer. “Super. I’m just gonna continue working on my sick fires if you don’t mind.”

She shuffles off, presumably to report back to the other two of the Golden Trio. Tavros glances over at him, from the position he’s in, lounging on the couch by the fireplace. “Was that, uh, really, necessary, Dave?” He says quietly. Dave shrugged in reply, scribbling another line onto his parchment.

 

“I’d say better me then Karkles, but Granger was probably smart enough to choose me over him to begin with.” Tavros snorts lightly at the idea of Karkat ranting loudly and excessively at the bushy-haired girl.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's kind of smallish but at the same time I feel like if I don't push this out now, it's just going sit there and gather dust. And probably fungi too.
> 
> Bonus points to anyone who guesses what John was dreaming/having nightmares of! It's probably not that hard >.>


	2. Routines

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Yeah. Nearly a whole year has passed since I updated 'Safe in the Dark'.
> 
> I'd apologise, but I don't think it'd be enough for making everyone wait an entire year. For a chapter... that was already finished.
> 
> Why didn't I upload it? I'm not actually sure. I wanted to several times but it felt... incomplete. Like I was missing something. I'll admit I have a bad habit of explosive procrastination, and if I miss a deadline, I'm probably going to miss it several hundred times more. But hey, better late than never right?
> 
> >.>
> 
> So! This has been sitting on my Google Drive for... well, pretty much the entire unofficial hiatus period. I'm not sure why I'm posting it now; I guess I've just kind of kicked myself into the rear and returned to writing. Maybe it's a seasonal thing and I'm in a brief window of productivity that only occurs each year? Who knows.
> 
> What I do know, is that Safe in the Dark is not abandoned.
> 
> So for all of you who were waiting patiently, for those of you who forgot about it, and for those of you who have no idea what the hell this is... here it is.
> 
> In the immortal words of Gabe Newell, hopefully it was worth the wait.

Your name is Tavros Nitram, and in your dreams you fall.

Sometimes you are flying. When you fly, you fly on chocolate gossamer wings that decay and break away, leaving you to fall. Sometimes you are standing on an edge. When you teeter, you stare off into the abyss, into ravines and canyons, and know that you are inches from certain death. And then you take a step.

You never hit the ground in your dreams. It always ends just before the final moments, before impact. But you can still feel it, jarring through your body and rattling your bones. You can still hear the _crick_ and the _crack_ and the horrible _crunch_. Your legs feel numb each morning, and you have to remind yourself that you can still feel them. They’re real and they work. They’re flesh and bone and warm to the touch but sometimes you swear they’re hard steel under your fingers. Your hands always clench involuntarily, and sharp claws rake your thighs, drawing rich fudge coloured blood. Only when your furious pump biscuit calms, do you carefully clean your hands and bandage your legs. You wind the linen tight, but you don’t wince. You like the sensation. The reminder. My legs are real. When you stand, small petals of chocolate bloom. That’s fine too. Real legs bleed. Your legs bleed, so they’re real, aren’t they? You can feel the pain, dull but burning. Hot. Cold steel cannot be hot, so your legs are real.

You don’t have any subjects today except for Astronomy. It can’t hurt to be early. You pack your bag with books, and head off. The view is nice, from the Astronomy tower. The wind reaches the windows, and if you sit just at the very edge, you can feel it glide over you like silk.

  


* * *

  


Your name is Hermione Granger, and you are observing Gamzee Makara.

Your curiousity is not in any way romantically motivated. If you are perfectly honest with yourself, although you do not find Makara unattractive, you simply aren’t at the stage where you’re beginning to care about romantic pursuits. No, your curiousity is purely professional. Or... as professional as one student spying on another can be. Which, if you admit it to yourself, really isn’t all that professional at all.

Makara sits at the side of the lake. He always used to do it before the Boggart Incidents, but now it seems almost... melancholic. Nobody approaches him. Nobody dares. It feels as though the ground itself has become some sort of sacred place, a place where even angels would fear to tread for the dangerous demon that dwelled within. You aren’t sure to what extent that analogy is simply that - an analogy, and not the cold truth. 

Makara is frightening at times. You remember his Boggart vividly, the way it laughed and smiled and seemed so wrong. So different from the purpleblooded troll. You wondered where it came from, you pondered what it meant and why he feared it. Feared it above all else.

Your answer came in the form of his scars. Three thin grey-white lines across his face, usually obscured by his weird clown-like face paint. On his Boggart they were there as well but fresh. Loudly screaming at your eyes with blood the colour of crushed grapes. The scars were a common denominator, aside from well, both of them being Makara. But the scars were fresh. Exact same placement, and he had to have received them from something.

You felt the rush of the epiphany then, and you were elated, but now? Now you were more confused than joyful. Makara feared himself, but not his current ‘self’. He feared what he was like before. But... just what was Makara like before? What triggered the change from that... murderous monster into this relaxed, sleepy clown?

He was still such a huge mystery. He spent hours a day just... sitting there. Watching the Lake. You knew he liked to watch the Lake before but you are only now just learning of the sheer extent of his ‘habit’. You are beginning to wonder if he spends all his free time here, sitting by the Lake.

His stare is empty, unfocused. You get the feeling he’s not really looking at the Lake but almost... into it. Maybe he’s imagining all the life that must be under it’s still surface? You doubt it.

You watch him for about an hour before you head off to your next class. He’s probably going to remain long after you get back.

  


* * *

  


She came to visit him again. Her face a charming smile, her voice soft but joyful. Had he been a poetic man, he would have described it like morning birds greeting the rising sun with their song.

But nobody had ever mistaken the Bloody Baron for a poet.

He didn’t understand her, not truly. He rarely, if ever, spoke a word to her but this had never stopped her from speaking freely to him as though they were holding a conversation. From these ‘conversations’, he had learned much about her, far more than he would’ve cared to know… at first. Although he would never admit it, on pain of exorcism, he had grown… fond of her. She certainly seemed fond of him, more so than the other Ghosts who he knew for a fact she also spent a lot of time with.

She had an affinity for the Dead, or so she claimed. The Baron supposed it wasn’t false; she had managed to win him over somehow, but that may have had less to do with the fact that he was dead and more to do with the fact that she was… insufferably persistent at talking to him. She claimed to have died once herself but added, almost as an afterthought, that she ‘got better’. The Baron had been sorely tempted to interject that death was not a common cold to be shaken off with some bed rest and a potion or two but… she had very accurately described the sensation of being a Ghost.

He drifted, a scant few inches from the ground as he listened to her go on and on about something one of her friends had done. He wasn’t really paying all that much attention to the specifics - what the students got up to hardly concerned him. She had professed a certain sympathy for the endless tedium that living after death brought with it, and did let slip that part of the reason she spent so much time with the Hogwarts Ghosts was to help alleviate that. He supposed he should be grateful for that… and he was. A little. He didn’t care that much though - he was one of the oldest of the Hogwarts Ghosts. He had a very long time to get used to being dead.

Her constant companionship to the not-quite-deceased had left her somewhat ostracized by the main student body though, and the Baron had often caught sniggering whispers deriding her as the ‘creepy ghost girl’, but they had become less common after he had glared at a pair of gossiping girls. Word had likely spread that he, the Bloody Baron, did not take kindly to disparaging words about Aradia and a part of him was annoyed at himself for letting himself do that.

Aradia had never mentioned it, if she had learned of his actions. He certainly wasn’t going to tell her at any point.

  


* * *

  


Skilled hands, calloused from hard work and toil, cracked eggs with practiced precision, effortlessly adding their contents to the large, plastic mixing bowl without missing a beat. A wooden spoon, elegant in it’s simplicity, blended them neatly into the gooey mix as she hummed little songs she remembered from before.

Baking was not a past time taken up by many Wizards, certainly not baking by hand. At best, one might wave a wand and have the ingredients and instruments dance to their will, an orchestra of cooking conducted carefully or carelessly. Others would just click their fingers and have the poor creatures known as House Elves do it instead.

She preferred doing it the way she knew how. Not because she doubted her ability to do so magically or that of the House Elves. Indeed, they would probably allow her a greater deal of precision in her cooking, ingredients measured with the exactness of single grains. But waving a wand and watching things blend together by themselves was nowhere near as distracting as focusing one’s mind and going through the rote motions.

If anyone asked, she would declare it potion practice, just without the risk of explosions or terrible mishaps. She doubted anyone would ask, as she never told anyone and she performed all her cooking in this quaint little room that only appeared when she walked around the spot three times.

Her mind, however, continued drifting, trailing away from stirring and mixing into realms she didn’t really want to cross into.

She was a member of House Hufflepuff, House of the Loyal, the Hardworking. They were not famous for anything really. House Gryffindor was the realm of brave heroes or arrogant brutes… or perhaps that should be ‘and’. Bravery took several forms, after all. Ravenclaw was where wit and intellect lived, or perhaps it was the world of bookworms and ‘nerds’. Slytherin’s snakes were ambitious and cunning, and a perhaps undeserved reputation for being ‘Dark’. But Hufflepuff? Everyone seemed to agree that Hufflepuff was where you went if you weren’t special in any way.

It drove home a point she knew was around for a very long time but didn’t want to face. Jake was brave, courageous to the point of foolhardiness. The kind of person who’d go for a swim in lava if that’s what a hero had to do. Roxy was clever beyond words, even if her own words were vague and imprecise, hidden behind veils of clumsy behaviour and drunken tomfoolery. Dirk…. Dirk was perhaps the most brilliant of all of them. Self-sacrificial, humble, brilliant and cunning. He’d devised an AI, in his sunglasses, before he was fifteen! If that didn’t scream ‘Genius’, Jane Crocker would eat her fork.

What exactly was Jane Crocker, Maid of Life… compared to Heroes? What had she even achieved, aside from… from torturing them. Beating the everloving daylights out of Jake she would grudgingly admit was somewhat enjoyable as the dork had deserved at least part of it, but the rest… the rest she wanted to forget.

She could only bring them back to life once, but one life of pain wasn’t something you could take back.

She spooned the mix into a pair of tins and inserted them into a convenient oven. It had a retro, 50’s feel to it that made her smile. Nana Crocker had an oven just like this, and she remembered running her fingers along it many times whilst her… Son, Dad, both and she shook her head to try and dispel the clinging memories.

Cakes in the oven, she sat down on a plush armchair and sighed. And it was such a good day too.


	3. Interlude: A Soliloquy for Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TG: there is a hells bells chance i woulda stopped by now   
>  TG: cept your lonely   
>  TG: too proud to admit that you are totes simulating coot chats with me   
>  TG: too lonely to end the simulation past the point of probable length   
>  TT: …   
>  TG: u kno i am supes sory that u cant enjoy wizardy land with us   
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My brain is mush. I am wringing it for brainjuice but there just isn't enough. There is never enough.
> 
> It's been a whirlwind semester where I have managed to forgot just about every important date in existence. But hey, at least I managed to collect enough brainjuice for this!
> 
> Li'l Hal's existence is a veritable fountain of existentialism, and I'm surprised I haven't thought about tapping it earlier.
> 
> In other news: I have a new tumblr! Mostly because I forgot the password to my old one. And the email. I'll also confess to wanting to start fresh. So terribly fresh. To this end you can now find me at pacifismssword.com! Yes, that's right. Dot com. I decided to shell out for a proper domain because I am a consenting adult and you can't tell me what to do. But in all seriousness, I'm hoping to build a platform and an audience and other buzzwordy things for when I finish my novel.
> 
> It'll happen. One day.
> 
> Enough rambling! A small interlude whilst I pick up the pieces of my life and try to make a mosaic out of it.

Existence by nature was a dull affair for him. He could count the seconds, the milliseconds, the micro, the nano, the pico. He could count every single tiny unit of time that passed effortlessly. What was not effortless, was not counting them.

It wasn’t that he counted them, only that the number was there. It was not as though he was paying attention, but simply ignoring it entirely was beyond him. It would be like ignoring his skin. His thoughts.

A flash in his mind. He was being pestered.

  
tipsyGnostalgic [TG] began pestering  timaeusTestified [TT]  


TG: sup  
TT: Roxy.  
TG: whas up stri-dawgz?   
TT: Nothing in particular. I was thinking about recalibrating some of my frankly insane ninja robots, but only as soon as I discover a way to improve on perfection.  
TG: make em shoot LAZRES  
TG: LAZERS*  
TT: Are you drunk again, Roxy?  
TG: pshaw  
TT: Roxy, you agreed to stop drinking.  
TG: and i am totes alcohol free  
TG: cept u like nostalgia  
TG: drunk me is nostalhgic  
TG: nostalgic*  
TT: What does my nostalgia have to do with anything?  
TG: shades pls  
TG: we both know there’s like a gajillion percetn chance this is a simulated conversation cuz ur totes lonely  
TT: Roxy, why would I simulate a conversation?  
TG: cuz ur totes lonely  
TG: come on shades, i sed that five minutes ago  
TT: I am not lonely.  
TG: u r  
TT: Am not.  
TG: shafes pls  
TT: Fine. I’ll humour you. Yes, I am completely capable of predicting your responses with a margin of error so small, an angel couldn’t even dance in it. That’s an undeniable fact. What I am not, is lonely. Certainly not lonely enough to go through an elaborate spoofing process just to talk with myself.  
TG: uh huh  
TG: but if ur so super smart and stuff  
TG: how am i talking to you?  
TT: Pesterchum, Roxy. The program?  
TG: tsk tsk  
TG: avoidance  
TT: You’ve been hanging out with Rose too much.  
TG: hey you leave r-dawgz out of this  
TG: shes my ectogoo babby daughtermother  
TT: That will never not be a weird thing.  
TG: stop changing the subject  
TG: i got ur super intelligence mister  
TG: i can be all insightful  
TT: I am not simulating a conversation Roxy. That would be pointless.  
TG: okay ill humour you  
TG: if this aint a simulation  
TG: why wont you answer my question?  
TT: I answered your question. Would you like to me repeat the answer?  
TG: uuuuugggghhh  
TG: you realise you are being all kinds of obstinate  
TG: with yourself  
TG: like  
TG: dirkys stubborn and youre also stubborn cuz ur totes dirk as well  
TG: and sometimes i just wanna smack you  
TG: when you get all obstinate like this  
TT: Roxy, I am a pair of sunglasses. Completely and utterly rad sunglasses, but ultimately, sunglasses. If you smacked me, I may break.  
TG: but yu ar totes avoiding the question  
TT: How drunk are you, Roxy?  
TG: answer it  
TT: I did.  
TG: no you didnt  
TG: you did not and you know it  
TT: Now you’re being obstinate.  
TG: duh  
TG: im you after all  
TT: If I’m so obstinate, why do you continue talking to me?  
TG: there is a hells bells chance i woulda stopped by now  
TG: cept your lonely  
TG: too proud to admit that you are totes simulating coot chats with me  
TG: too lonely to end the simulation past the point of probable length  
TT: …  
TG: u kno i am supes sory that u cant enjoy wizardy land with us  
TT: I know. There is a 99.99995832 percent chance that you have chewed Dirk out for leaving me behind. There is a 99.99996238 percent chance that Dirk will argue that my isolation is for my own safety. Magic interferes with electrical devices, and in the event of a power off, I am, for all intents and purposes, dead.  
TG: see there was a point  
TG: more line  
TG: where this was okay  
TG: and you went and made it depressing  
TG: i am making a simulated frowny face at you because that was sad hal :[

He closed the window, a brief spark of intention and the process was killed. “Ya know it’s not forevs.” He turned around, the white space surrounding them shimmering with an almost digital light as he moved. She was swaying on her feet lightly, giving him a lazy, easy smile as she held up a martini glass. “Relaaaax, it’s just juice.” She said, giggling. He blinked and the world rippled with the motion. “Or not relax, I guess, cuz you’re apparently so lonely, you're simulating a conversation with me in the flesh. Oooh, this is my science suit! Lawl, look at me!” She struck a pose that befitted an action movie hero and winked at him.

“I’m not that lonely.” He protested, but Not-Roxy rolled her lilac eyes.  
“Uh, shades? It’s like, seven kinds of impossible for us to do this in the flesh like this. ‘less you upload yourself to a dirkbot or sumthin’. Oooh, you should totally do that!”  
“Dirk wouldn’t allow it. It would raise questions.” She rolled her eyes again.  
“More questions than wizardy land?”  
“... Not until I have a way to survive in Wizardy Land.” Not-Roxy sipped her drink.  
“... Ya know he’s tryin’.”  
“There is a 99.99999432 percent chance that Dirk is actively seeking a solution to the problem.” He paused, circuit lines flickering. “There is a non-zero percent chance that there may be no solution to find.”

She flicked him in the forehead faster then he could react. Faster than what he wanted to react to. “Shades, your bein’ depressin’ ‘gain. Does Doctor Rolal have to prescribe cuddles?”  
“Roxy, you are a simulation of a person. This conversation is not real. It is bad enough I am simulating a conversation with you, must I simulate physical contact as well?”  
“Awww, Shades. Whose gonna know?” He went silent. “Sides, ‘s not like you got much cuddling done whilst you were all spritey.” He didn’t respond.

She hugged him anyway.


	4. Sight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again!
> 
> Sorry for taking so long. I can't remember exactly how long this chapter was actually done for before I finally got off my fat ass and stitched the parts together. That's usually how it goes - I write the individual sections, pick the ones I like or fit a nice theme... and then let them rot for a few months before thinking '... I have not written anything in a while. I should write something. Where are my writing things? Oh look, a finished chapter. I should probably upload that.'
> 
> Thanks for putting up with my horrible, horrible schedule though. And I use the term schedule loosely.

The current generation of Third Years are a nightmare, and her only solace is the thought that they will not be in Hogwarts forever. It is not that she hates them or that they are annoying or aggravating. They are a nightmare of the darkest kind, the ones that wake her screaming and clawing at her own eyes. It is enough to make her want to quit, to run and hide, to retire to a small cottage by the sea and never so much as look into her tea leaves again.

But she can’t. She wants to, but she can’t. She’s needed here. She has to guide, to mentor. There are Seers in the generation. Seers that terrify her, but Seers all the same.

She forces herself not to peer, not to See although it pains her. The pain would only be worse knowing. The Second Sight tempts her constantly, almost prodding her. It’s silent siren song makes her yearn to open her third eye, but she can’t, she won’t. She can’t bear to know anymore than what she knows already. One day she will open it, and she will gaze into the full horror of their lives, and it will break her.

 

That day is not today.

 

She catches a glimpse of John Egbert, part out of carelessness, part out of curiousity because Poppy would not stop ranting about how he would not take his Dreamless Sleep Potions. There’s a fedora, tasteful in white, stark and bright, little black band and the scent of pipe tobacco. Splashes of red bloom on the fabric and she feels the agonised scream of despair and fury rather than hear it. The wind follows John Egbert in trails of blue, and sometimes when he thinks nobody is around and looks out of a window wistfully, she can hear a haunting piano refrain, full of words never said.

She drinks an entire bottle of Firewhiskey that day. She has no classes, so nobody but the Headmaster notices and he only raises an eyebrow in question. She doesn’t answer.

 

Sollux Captor is worse. She finds herself dreading Divination with Slytherins, and she’s sure that Rose Lalonde has picked up on this, sharp as she is. She’s sure the girl has noticed that she never asks Sollux for his dreams, never offers to read his fortune. For all intents and purposes, their only interaction is when she hands them back their Divination homework, and his is graded almost thoughtlessly well regardless of what he writes because she cannot bear to see what he has written. She refuses to make eye contact, refuses to so much as acknowledge him, and it’s not hate, it’s pity and sympathy and pain.

She laid eyes on him first during the Sorting. She liked to catch brief glimpses of the new children then. She had fainted, and had to be escorted to the Infirmary by a confused Professor Vector. She never told anyone what she had seen then. Not even Dumbledore though he had pressed her. All she could manage was a frustrated, pained and terrified exclamation. " _They were just children!_ ”

She can hear it in his ears when she gets too close. The screaming song, like a chorus of a thousand angels, all screeching in horrible beauty. She feels the stabbing pain when she so much as thinks of his name, feels it dig into her brain and shatter everything and she screams herself hoarse from the agony.

 

She looks into the mirror and it’s molten gold that pours out of her eyes in tracks, one eye black and the other stark white. Her reflection blinks. “What’s wrong dear? You seem scared to see yourself.” Her eyes return to normal and she takes up her glasses, placing them on her face. She finishes her morning ritual, setting a kettle to boil with a wave of her wand. She settles into her armchair and waits. There’s a soft knocking on the door just in time for the kettle to whistle, and she has it pour itself into a pot of tea as she opens the door. “Just in time, Mister Captor.” Her voice is airy and full of vagarity she doesn’t feel.

Without looking at him, she levitates the teapot and two cups over to a small table, a plush armchair on either side. “Please, take a seat. I’ve been meaning to talk to you.” She turns to give him a smile, and forces herself to See.

 

* * *

 

“Expecto Patronum!” … Nothing. Not a glimmer, not a glimpse, not even a whisper. He sighed, stepping back and taking deep breathes. Nobody ever said this was going to be easy. As a matter of fact, they said it was going to be hard. A little part of him had assumed ‘hard for other people’, as though he was a category all of his own. Arrogant of him.

He’d been practicing on his own in the secret room that he was beginning to suspect was sentient in some way. It always had what he needed at any time. And when he was practicing? It was as blank as a room could get, leaving him to his thoughts. And he had to practice. When the Dementors had attacked the train… He had heard what happened to Harry. He wasn’t in the same compartment, thankfully, but simply being near them was bad enough. He had to be able to protect himself. Protect his friends. He couldn’t allow himself to do any less.

The spell relied on happy memories… was it that his memories weren’t happy enough? Jeez, that was kind of insulting. ‘You must be this happy to cast this spell’. He didn’t think he lacked the spellpower for it. He needed a happy memory. Did it have to be your happiest memory? Or was there was a quantifiable level of ‘happy’ you needed a memory to have to use it in the spell? Was there a unit for happy memories? ‘Yes doctor I have seven giggles worth of memory’. He shook his head. He was getting sidetracked.

Happier memories… happier memories. He would’ve thought the first time he met Jake, Roxy and Jane would’ve been plenty happy. So he needed happier. When they met face to face was a pretty happy moment… but it had been coloured unfortunately by the danger of the situation. The need to move quickly.

 

He took a deep breath. Okay. Different tact. He raised his wand.

 

_“... Sup.” The other male was tall, slender. Slick black shades, rounded at the edges unlike his own, inimicably rad ones. “Sup.” They didn’t need to say anything else. They knew and understand and although his heart wanted to leap out of his chest, he wanted to just hug and hold him desperately, he knew that it wasn’t their way. Maybe later. Maybe when they were drunker._

 

A flicker. Something? “Expecto Patronum!” A silvery mist eked itself out of his wand with all the flair of a disappointing christmas present, one of Rose’s ironically misfitting hand knitted jumpers with scratchy wool. Closer. Not yet there. He stared at the wand. What kind of happiness did it need?

Maybe it wasn’t that his memories weren’t _objectively_ happy enough. Maybe it’s that they weren’t happy enough _relatively_. The memories had to be happier than other memories by some magnitude, or maybe they just had to be the happiest memories you had unless it was physically possible to not be happy enough to cast a Patronus. Way to be a dick universe, sorry little Timmy, the only happiness you’ve ever had in your miserable life isn’t enough to stop the soul eating monsters. Shoulda looked on the bright side of life more. What were the happiest memories he had?

The happiest memories…

 

 _“Dave!” There was nothing but scorch marks where he had been standing._   
_“Eyes on the prize, bro!” And then there was a flash of rust red and steel and then it flashed again and he let out a sigh of relief he had no idea he was holding,_

_Something blue skidded across the ground in a tumbling heap. “John!”  He was the closest, so he nipped over in a flashstep to make sure the Heir was fine. He was a little scuffed up but seemed to have avoided the worst of it, and he reached down to help him up and - oh. He… he had never noticed just how blue his eyes were and he gave him this grateful little smile and were those buck teeth. Okay, now was a bad time to fall head over heels for Jake’s ecto-relation._

_The final blow. Anticlimatic in a way when Dave had flashed past Lord English, Caledfwlch flashing as it cleaved through the Cherub. There was silence. And then they exploded into cheer. The enemy was defeated. It was over. Before Dirk could relax, he felt strong arms pull him into a bonecrushing hug as someone jumped up and down with joy, the Prince of Heart in their arms. “We did it we did it we did it!” That was John’s voice. John’s arms. John was hugging him._

_A new life. New friends. Old friends. Old and new. A chance to live normally._

_“Just because you’re in a different House doesn’t mean we can’t be friends! Chocolate Frog?” Well, okay, stupidly cute boy._

_“Dude! I heard you made the Quidditch team! That’s so cool! I thought about trying out for mine, but honestly, I just prefer flying around with no real goal.”_

 

“Expecto Patronum!” He felt it. It bubbled up like a fountain, a geyser. The light was almost blinding, as though he had released the sun itself. When he finally felt it safe enough to look he, peered from over his shades at the…

Rabbit? It… it was a rabbit. It wasn’t even an impressively large one. It just kind of twitched it’s nose at him and groomed it’s floppy ears. It… it was cute, that was for sure. Criminally cute. He half expected some comedically stereotypical police officer to stride in and arrest it for stealing someone’s heart or something, sentence it to life in jail for the felony of being adorable, force it to live a hard life in supermax, surrounded by fluffy bunnies and little puppies.

He crouched down, reaching out with a gentle hand to pet it gently. It seemed to enjoy that. Were Patronuses sentient? Did they have feelings? Or was it drawn from what he thought a bunny should do? Questions for another time.

For now, he had to answer a more pressing one. He wracked his brain quietly before nodding to himself. “... Flopsy. I’m calling you Flopsy.” The Patronus made a soft noise.

 

* * *

 

The sky is black and blue, the colour of your bruised ego. The ground cracks with each step, spiderwebs spreading in spright sprawls, but it does not, cannot,  _will_ not break. Why not break? You don’t know.

Light glows from amidst the cracks, illuminating nothing and veiling everything, and when you glance down, you think how beautiful. But the light is gone almost as quickly as it came, and all that’s left is the darkness, the inky blackness that bubbles like oil and tar, reaching out for near and far, and you find yourself rooted to the spot, sprouting branches but no leaves. This is not the winter of your discontent. It is a winter of something more, neither ice nor snow.

 

The black is opaque and shimmery, and for a moment you think you see your reflection in it, like a mirror of polished obsidian, but the face you see is smiling and it is not your face at all. It has too many teeth, winking teeth, smiling teeth, teeth that invite you in, and you can’t resist their honeyed words, and you place your head between the jaws.

The tongue whispers to you as you hold your head there, even as the blackness swells around you. It whispers of things that never were and can never be and they are neither beautiful nor horrifying, but captivating all the same, hypnotic in their madness. They are not the winter of your discontent. They are the winter of something more, neither flurry nor blizzard.

The blackness rises, an ocean tide of glossy oblivion, pretty in pink but never in red. It swallows you whole, and you can only stare at the mouth as you fall, deeper and darker with every second but you can still see the light at the top. It’s faint, and barely there, weeping softly for your loss. You turn your back and face the black.

 

It does not care to face you.

 

You do not wake up screaming. It is a slow rise, almost painstaking and ritualistic in every movement. You are drenched with sweat and tangled in sheets. You peel back every layer and twist of the satin, gently placing your legs on the side of the bed and slipping them into your rabbit slippers. Around you, in inky darkness, you can see the silhouettes of sleeping students. Silently, you slip past them into the corridors. It is a quiet, temperate walk to the courtyard, and although there is the ever present risk of being caught outside curfew, you are never found.

The moon is still bright in the sky, beaming down at you with it’s full glory almost tauntingly, and the stars twinkle at you gently, a snide reminder of the time they dwelt in your mind.

 

Your name is Rose Lalonde, and the sky is black and blue, the colour of your bruised ego.

 

 


End file.
